Every Sunday morning, thousands of southern Chester County residents attend church. This is nothing new. However, on a recent Sunday, something special happened. Two churches — Living Faith Community Church (LFCC), a 250-member congregation in Jennersville, and Willowdale Chapel, a 1,200-member congregation in Kennett Square — became one.

On June 8, both facilities opened their doors as usual; but for the first time, 1,450 people worshipped as a single church in two locations. Willowdale Chapel had adopted Living Faith Community Church.

What is a church adoption? Authors Jim Tomberlin and Warren Bird of the Leadership Network coined the phrase, “Better Together,” which is also the title of their recent book. They describe church adoption as a strategic response to declining church memberships across North America. Through the church adoption process, they explain, two churches combine forces within a single organization. In so doing, they leverage the strengths of each, to better fulfill their missional impact on the world. Typically, one of the churches is larger and more dynamic; the other needs parenting.

After a year of discussing the merits of a potential adoption, the leadership teams of Willowdale and LFCC became convinced the two churches would be better together than apart. Willowdale had been pursuing the launch of a second site in the Jennersville/West Grove area. Meanwhile, LFCC had been searching for greater levels of effectiveness in reaching that same community. Willowdale and LFCC concluded they could more effectively serve people throughout the region by becoming a single church. Willowdale invited LFCC to join them in growing a gospel-centered movement in southern Chester County. They asked LFCC to become the second campus of Willowdale, under the direction and spiritual leadership of the Willowdale team. On April 6 the vote took place with 100 percent of the leadership of both churches and 98 percent of the members voting in favor of the adoption.

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In spite of this, mixed emotions marked those first Sunday services. One week earlier, Living Faith had said goodbye to their beloved founding pastor, Chip Roper, who had faithfully served for 20 years.

When Roper was asked why he volunteered to step down from his role as senior pastor of LFCC to support the adoption, he said, “The dream that LFCC would be a place where Jesus changes lives will only be enhanced through the adoption. With greater focus, resources, expertise and numbers of committed people, we see our dream thriving in this scenario.”

Johnny Johnston, who had been the Family Ministries pastor at LFCC, remains to become the Jennersville campus pastor. Willowdale’s Senior Pastor Greg Lafferty will provide overall pastoral leadership to both campuses.

The original Willowdale Chapel in Kennett Square said goodbye to some of its long-term members who are transferring to Jennersville to help launch the new Willowdale campus and to train new leaders. Church members from both locations were saying “goodbye” to the old and saying” hello” to the new.

This newer, larger Willowdale Chapel also has a strong sense of humor. Jennersville’s Johnston used his smartphone camera to pan the congregation, instructing them to look sad and angry at first, and then to cheer and whoop in celebration. The video was sent to Kennett and shown during the service. Meanwhile, Marc Lucenius, Kennett campus pastor, was supposedly videoing the Kennett congregation, too. He sent Jennersville a shot of an empty worship center, with only two people in attendance, followed by his verbal resignation. But then, of course, the real Kennett congregation appeared on screen, shouting and clapping for its Jennersville sister church.

The pervading emotion was joy. The combined congregations were celebrating their vision of greater spiritual growth, increased outreach and targeted community involvement. The promise of this is rejuvenating both campuses.

As Lafferty frequently says to guests from the platform, “It might feel weird to you showing up at a new church, but it’s not weird for us. We have new people visiting all the time, and we would love to meet you and help you feel at home. You’re among friends!”

The new, larger, two-site Willowdale Chapel invites all to participate, Sunday at 9 or 11 a.m., at either location.